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Literature
– Call for Articles

Organic Machines/Engineered Humans: (Re)Defining Humanity

The Humanities Education and Research Association invites papers from diffferent disciplines and areas of study for the Spring 2018 edition of their Scholarly Journal "Interdisciplinary Humanities". Topics will focus on transhumanism, the singularity, and the arrival of the bio-engineered human/machine interface.

Documents to: dore.ripley[at]gmail.com

From E.T.A Hoffmann's Tales of Hoffmann and Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? to Isaac Asimov's I, Robot, Vernor Vinge's Rainbows End and Warren Ellis' Transmetropolitan authors have been exploring the human/machine interface since before the computer age. Today we stand on the threshold to the lab as the government contemplates microchipping all U.S. military personnel and Swedish office workers are already implanting themselves for convenience ala M.T. Anderson's Feed.

A 2014 study conducted by Cisco Systems found approximately one-quarter of the white-collar professionals surveyed "would leap at the chance to get a surgical brain implant that allowed them to instantly link their thoughts to the Internet". We are already experimenting with gene therapy, cybernetics via cochlear implants and many other technical organic enhancements, autonomous self-replicating robots, nanotechnology, mind uploading, and artificial intelligence.

This edition of Interdisciplinary Humanities will consider topics focused on the arrival of the bio-engineered human/machine interface and what it means for the humanities. Should STEM be geared towards STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics) in order to incorporate rhetoric and critical thinking into the scientific method in order to encourage the study of consequences, instead of just outcomes.

Disciplines of study include art, philosophy and religion, literature, music and dance, play, visual arts, architecture, performing mediums, as well as ethnic and women's studies as we redefine identity and the diversity of our species through the dynamic interplay between humanity and the acceleration of technology. Multiple disciplines will help us understand and grapple with how we will redefine identity and the diversity of our species through the dynamic interplay of humanity and the acceleration of technology.

The Humanities Education and Research Association, Interdisciplinary Humanities’ parent organization, requires that authors become members of HERA if their essays are accepted for publication. Information on membership may be found at:www.h-e-r-a.org/hera_join.htm.